Saturday, July 27, 2013

They should be putting up statues for Ed

RIA Novosti reports, "The United States has assured Russia that it will not
seek the death penalty for Edward Snowden or torture the fugitive former
intelligence contractor, the US Justice Department said Friday amid
Washington's ongoing efforts to secure Moscow’s assistance in returning
him to the United States to face espionage charges."

Oh, okay.

As long as the US government says so, I'll believe it. Won't you?

It's not as if the US government has a pattern of lying, right?

The way I see it, pretty much every time the US government makes a claim regarding Ed Snowden, they're basically staking out ground they're intending to break shortly.

Ed is a whistle-blower. His revelations have had so much impact and made a real difference.

Instead of being chased and harassed by the Us government, they should be building statues of Ed across the country.

Friday, July 26, 2013. Chaos and violence continue, protests continue
in Iraq, Nouri prepares to spend more money on weapons (while protesters
demand basic public services like drinkable water and electricity), one
of the prison escapees is caught in a Baghdad mosque, Bradley Manning's
defense offers closing arguments, the US government insists that they
have no desire to kill Ed Snowden, and more.

Since December 21st
protests have been ongoing in Iraq. It has been seven months. Many,
possibly basing their conclusions on 2011 events, wrongly thought that
the holy month of Ramadan would stop the protests. While Ramada
continues through August 7th, the fact is that Ramadan did not stop the
protests or greatly reduce the turnout. There's one Friday left.

As for demands regarding public services, Wael Grace (Al Mada) reports
that members of Parliament's Energy Committee state that the failure of
the ministries to corrodinate and the mismanagement of government have
left Iraq worse off in terms of power and that Nouri al-Maliki's two
years of foot dragging with regards to a contract with Shell has left
Iraq no where near able to provide the needed electricity to the
citizens. Nouri's government can't provide the basic public services. The Iraq Times reports that Nouri is gearing up to purchase 12 helicopters and assorted other items from the United States. Kitabat adds that Nouri's prepping to spend 2 billion. Paul McLeary (Defense News) notes, "The Defense Department notified Congress on Thursday that it is working
on three deals with the government of Iraq to sell $1.9 billion worth of
military equipment and logistical support to the country, including
Stryker infantry vehicles, helicopters and maintenance and logistical
support for its fleet of American-made ground vehicles."

WASHINGTON,
July
25
, 2013
–
The Defense Security Cooperation Agency notified Congress
today
of
a
possible Foreign Military Sale
to
Iraq
of
Multi
-
Platform Maintenance
a
nd associated equipment, parts, training
and logistical support for an estimated cost of
$
750
million
. The Government of Iraq has requested a possible sale
to
provide for a five year follow
-
on maintenance support
for the M88A1 Recovery Vehicle, M88A2 Hercules, M113 Family of Vehicles, M109A5 Howitzers, M198
Howitzers, M1070 Heavy Equipment Trailer and Truck (HETT), M977 Heavy Expanded Mobility Tactical
Truck (HEMTT
), High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicle (HMMWV), and the Tactical Floating River
Bridge System (TFRBS) Including, spare and repair parts, support equipment, publications and technical data,
personnel training and training equipment, site surveys, Quality Assurance Teams, U.S. Government and
contractor technical assistance, and other related elements of program and logistics support.
The estimated cost
is $750 million. This proposed sale will contribute to the foreign policy and national security of the United States by helping to
improve the security of a
strategic partner
.
This proposed sale directly supports the Iraqi government and serves
the interests of the Iraqi people and the United States. Helping Iraq maintain, sustain, and effectively utilize the equipment it has purchased or received from the
United States over the past decade is a U.S. priority. This proposed sale is essential to provide Iraq with the
support, spares, services, and equipment necessary to continue its effective use of its ground
-
based vehicle fleet. The proposed sale of this equipment and support will not alter the basic military balance in the region. The principal contractor
involved in this program
is
unknown
at this time
. There are no known offset
agreements proposed in connection with this potential sale. Implementation of this proposed
sale will require
multiple
U.S. Government or contractor representatives to
travel to Iraq
over period of (5) years
to
establish maintenance support, on
-
the
-
job (OJT) maintenance training
and maintenance advice for program and technical support and training. There will be no adverse impact on United
States
defense readiness as a result of this proposed sale. This notice of a potential sale is required by law and does not mean the sale has been concluded.

Meanwhile Mustafa al-Kadhimi (Al-Monitor) argues that Iraqi politicians have grown estranged from the people that they are supposed to represent:
In the local elections, talk of a 50-70% boycott of
the voting process was a real wake-up call. The politicians should have
felt and handled the reasons for this boycott, so that it does not turn
into a growing phenomenon challenging the legitimacy of the whole
democratic system.
Today — less than eight months before the general elections are to be
held — politicians should take to the street, share the street’s ideas,
feel the suffering of the population and initiate launching social
campaigns that prove the candidates are rooted in their communities.
Simply relying on pictures and slogans launched a few days prior to the
elections does not show that Iraq is a serious political society. Yet,
it repeatedly demonstrates that Iraq is controlled by the experiments of
amateurs who don't possess the keys to the future.

RT spoke with Stop the War's John Rees about the increase in violence. Excerpt.RT: It's a really alarming death toll we're talking
about here. Does this mean Iraq's incapable of maintaining
security on its own?

John Rees: I think what we are seeing is a long-term
effect of the war and occupation. In order to occupy Iraq the
Western forces, British and American, adopted a policy of divided
rule. They made a sectarian conflict where there wasn’t one
before. They created Al Qaeda in Iraq where there was no Al Qaeda
before. So I think that the country is suffering under the most
enormous strains as the result of that war and occupation. And
those strains are being reinforced by the conflict in Syria where
actually all sides are now attempting to gain leverage in that
conflict through Iraq as well as in Syria.

RT: But does Iraq really have enough
resources to contain the violence?

JR: We must hope that they do so but truth of the matter
is a terrifically weak government. It’s apparently divided in the
middle between the people who are sympathetic to Iran’s position
in the region and those who feel dependent on Washington. The
government only last year made a contract with Russia, as you
probably know, to become the second largest arm supplier after US
to Iraq. Turkey is constantly impinging on Iraqi air space in
order to pursue Kurds in the Iraqi Kurdish region. So it’s the
state that’s been left in a catastrophically weak position
by the occupation and which economic positions in the
Middle East are weakening still more.

As the American presence dissipated,
the Shi'ite majority, led by Maliki, quickly sought to consolidate power
and mete out retribution on their former Sunni rulers.Maliki's
aggressive consolidation of power immediately aggravated domestic
tensions. Rising to power in mid-2006, by 2007 he had staffed the higher
positions of government with Shia loyalists. Then he began distancing
his government from Sunni and Kurdish leaders, despite Petraeus'
reassurances to Sunni leaders.In 2009, he accused the
Sunni security forces, known as the Sons of Iraq, of being infiltrated
by Al Qaeda and Saddam-loyal Ba'athists — and analysts expressed
worry that Maliki would actually declare war on the Sons of Iraq the
moment the U.S. exited the country. This was rough treatment for the
group that was largely responsible for taming Al Qaeda in Iraq and
bringing peace to the restive western Anbar province.Maliki
could have reached out an olive branch to his rival, former Prime
Minister Ayad Allawi, whose Sunni-backed, secular-Shiite coalition —
called Iraqiya — represented a marginalized but relevant political body
in Iraq. Instead, he turned to Iran, seeking monetary backing from the
orthodox Shi'ite government.

Alsumaria reports that one escapee from Abu Ghraib prison was arrested today in an eastern Baghdad mosque. The Sunday
prison attacks and breaks only became news outside of Iraq when the
number of prisoners who escaped (between 500 and one thousand) was
announced on Monday. Since then, the attacks on two prisons and the escape of prisoners earlier this week
have prompted a great deal of the commentary on Iraq. Today, Jon Lee Anderson (New Yorker) weighs in:

The latest prison breakout includes, it is said, many senior terrorists,
including a number who had been sentenced to death. It took place this
past Sunday night, after a complex and bloody attack that included
mortars and suicide bombers, as well as an assault by commandos. Several
guards and inmates were killed. It comes a year to the day after Abu
Bakr al-Baghdadi, Iraq’s Al Qaeda chief, promised to free men from
Iraq’s prisons. In the meantime, the Iraqi and Syrian affiliates of Al
Qaeda have merged into what is called, with typical grandiloquence, “The
Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.”
That Baghdadi has been able to fulfill his promise so blatantly and
violently, under the noses of the U.S.-trained Iraqi security forces, is
extremely alarming. Al Qaeda in Iraq has been surging back, with
almost daily suicide attacks or car bombings, in a sectarian campaign
against Shiites, as well as with attacks on the Iraqi security forces.
Nearly three thousand people have died since April, and over seven
hundred have died in July alone. On Thursday, more than forty people
were killed in attacks
that included the bombing of a café and the execution, by Al Qaeda
commandos who, posing as security officers, set up a false checkpoint,
of Shiite drivers and passengers.

Sunni militants summarily executed at least 14 Shiites on
Thursday after setting up a roadblock north of Baghdad, stopping trucks
and checking the IDs of drivers, Iraqi officials said.

The
nighttime attack was reminiscent of the darkest days of the
Sunni-Shiite sectarian bloodshed in Iraq in 2006-2007, when thousands of
people were killed because of their religious affiliation or forced to
abandon their homes under threat of death.

Kitabat notes that Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani has termed the prison breaks to be a major scandal and one that puts many Iraqis at risk. All Iraq News quotes
Sadr bloc MP Suzan al-Saad calls the prison breaks "the most dangerous
threat to national security" and calls for the investigation to be sent
"to Maliki's office because the intelligence system is unable to settle
this issue." On political issues, we drop back to yesterday's snapshot:
Shocking news was reported in Iraq today but there was no effort by the
US press to pick it up nor was there any effort to ask a single question
about Iraq in today's State Dept press briefing. Dar Addustour reported that certain elements of the Iraqi government (these would be
Nouri and pro-Nouri elements -- that goes unstated in the article) are
considering a six-point plan that these elements state will address the
rising violence and curtail it. The plan will do no such thing. What
it will actually do, if implemented, is inflame tensions even further
and cause the slow building civil war to erupt in raging flames. So
what's Nouri's plan?

Dissolve the Parliament, abolish the Constitution, declare martial law,
allow only Iraqi military forces (central Iraq -- this would eject the
Peshmerga from all non-KRG areas -- and it would overrule provincial
forces -- to the outrage of many), continue executions under emergency
law (this would bypass the approval currently required from the
presidency) and cut off all telecommunications and internet.
This is not a plan for stability. It is a plan to carry out mass
killings and to do so as far away from the world's eye as possible. And
the most shocking thing may be that the western press hasn't even noted
this report.
In this already tense climate, Mohammad Sabah (Al Mada) reports
that Parliament is contemplating what is being termed a government of
salvation which would call for the resignation of Nouri al-Maliki as
prime minister in an effort to reduce violence and to address the
political crises. The plan is said to be discussed by members of
Iraqiya, Moqtada al-Sadr's bloc and the Turkmen Front. All Iraq News reports
that Speaker of Parliament Osama al-Nujaifi is stating that a salvation
government is not possible and that, "The current government will not
resign because the remaining time of its term is very short. We need a
national agreement and to nominate the security ministers and to have a
transparent revelation of what is going on in the country."

Earlier this week National Iraqi News Agency reported
that Nouri had declared that the Constitution was a failure "not fit to
build a state." Nouri's disrespect for the Constitution is also
evident in his refusal to appear before the Parliament. NINA also notes
Speaker of Parliament Osama al-Nujaifi declared yesterday that Nouri
continues ro refuse to appear despite ongoing requests. (The
Constitution gives Parliament the power to question Nouri in a public
session.) All Iraq News quotes
Iraqiya MP Waleed al-Muhamadi talking about the ongoing political
crises in Iraq and noting, "Maliki talked about the situation in Iraq as
if it is advanced and progressed and blamed all other sides excluding
himself over the deterioration in Iraq. If we want to overcome crises,
we have to admit mistakes and failures." Iraqiya is the political slate
that beat Nouri's State of Law in the 2010 parliamentary elections. The head of Iraqiya is Ayad Allawi. All Iraq News quotes
Allawi stating that Nouri refuses to follow the Constitution, "Despite
our repeated and honest calls for Maliki to adhere to the constitution,
he did not respond to our calls."

Also on the Parliament, All Iraq News notes, "MP, Etab al-Dori, of the Iraqiya Slate called to adhere to the
Open-slate system during the next parliamentary elections to avoid
involving the corrupted in the formation of the next government and to
increase the representation of women in about third of the seats of the
next parliament. "

QUESTION: Can you confirm, or have you seen the reports that
Iran has expressed the desire for direct talks with the U.S. regarding
its nuclear program? And if so, what kind of role will Iraq play in
that, if any?

MS. PSAKI: Well, we’ve seen reports. Of course, Iraq is a
partner of the United States, and we’re in regular conversations with
Iraqi officials about a full range of issues of mutual interest,
including Iran. As we’ve said many times, we’re open to direct talks
with Iran in order to resolve the international community’s concerns
about Iran’s nuclear program. And we work through, as you all know, the
P-5+1 and Under Secretary Sherman just had a meeting, I believe a couple
of weeks ago, with her counterparts. But it is – the ball is in Iran’s
court to take the necessary steps to abide by their international
obligations. And that has not changed.

QUESTION: Do you know --QUESTION: What about --QUESTION: Do you know if Prime Minister Maliki has offered himself up, or offered his services as an intermediary?MS. PSAKI: I don’t have anything on that for you.QUESTION: So you don’t know it’s that’s the case.MS. PSAKI: I just don’t have anything on it for you. I don’t have any more information on that.QUESTION: So, the – you’re saying --MS. PSAKI: It would also be – I would point you to the Government of Iraq and Iran on that specific –QUESTION: Did you ask people in this building if that was the case?MS. PSAKI: Of course we discuss these issues frequently. I don’t have anything more to tell you.QUESTION: And they wouldn’t – and so they wouldn’t answer you. You got no answer?MS. PSAKI: That – Matt – (Laughter.)QUESTION: I’m sorry, I don’t understand. The whole point of the story
that she was caught talking, that the question is based on --MS. PSAKI: Mm-hmm.QUESTION: -- is that according to notes taken from a meeting
with the U.S. – with U.S. diplomats in Iraq, the Prime Minister made
this offer. That’s the whole --MS. PSAKI: I don’t have anything more to tell you, Matt. That’s all – I’m going to leave it at that.

Today the defense made their closing argument in the court-martial of Bradley Manning. Richard A. Serrano (Los Angeles Times) reports, "Young, naive, gay and good-intentioned, wanting to save lives in a
combat zone, feeling responsible for U.S soldiers and Iraqi citizens and
hoping they all make it home safely -- that is the true Pfc. Bradley Manning, his chief defense attorney asserted Friday on the final day of his Army court-martial." Monday April 5,
2010, WikiLeaks released
military video of a July 12, 2007 assault in Iraq. 12 people were
killed in the assault including two Reuters journalists Namie Noor-Eldeen and
Saeed Chmagh. Monday June 7,
2010, the US military announced that they had arrested Bradley
Manning and he stood accused of being the leaker of the video. Leila Fadel
(Washington Post) reported in August 2010 that Manning had
been charged -- "two charges under the Uniform Code of Military Justice. The
first encompasses four counts of violating Army regulations by transferring
classified information to his personal computer between November and May and
adding unauthorized software to a classified computer system. The second
comprises eight counts of violating federal laws governing the handling of
classified information." In March, 2011, David S. Cloud
(Los Angeles Times) reported
that the military has added 22 additional counts to the charges including one
that could be seen as "aiding the enemy" which could result in the death penalty
if convicted. The Article 32 hearing took place in December. At the start of
this year, there was an Article 32 hearing and, February 3rd, it was announced
that the government would be moving forward with a court-martial. Bradley has
yet to enter a plea. The court-martial was supposed to begin before the November 2012 election but it was
postponed until after the election so that Barack wouldn't have to run on a
record of his actual actions. Independent.ie adds, "A court martial is set to be held in June at Ford Meade in Maryland,
with supporters treating him as a hero, but opponents describing him as a
traitor." February 28th, Bradley admitted he leaked to WikiLeaks. And why.

Bradley Manning: In attempting to conduct counter-terrorism or CT and
counter-insurgency COIN operations we became obsessed with capturing and
killing human targets on lists and not being suspicious of and avoiding
cooperation with our Host Nation partners, and ignoring the second and
third order effects of accomplishing short-term goals and missions. I
believe that if the general public, especially the American public, had
access to the information contained within the CIDNE-I and CIDNE-A
tables this could spark a domestic debate on the role of the military
and our foreign policy in general as [missed word] as it related to Iraq
and Afghanistan.
I also believed the detailed analysis of the data over a long period of
time by different sectors of society might cause society to reevaluate
the need or even the desire to even to engage in counterterrorism and
counterinsurgency operations that ignore the complex dynamics of the
people living in the effected environment everyday.

For truth telling, Brad's being punished by the man who fears truth:
Barack Obama. A fraud, a fake, a 'brand,' anything but genuine, Barack
is all marketing, all facade and, for that reason, must attack each and
every whistle-blower. David Delmar (Digital Journal) points out, "President Obama, while ostensibly a liberal advocate
of transparency and openness in government, and of the 'courage' and
'patriotism' of whistleblowers who engage in conscientious leaks of
classified information, is in reality something very different: a
vindictive opponent of the free press willing to target journalists for
doing their job and exposing government secrets to the public."

The Voice of Russia reports on the defense's closing argument:"You have to see it through the eyes of someone who cares
about everybody," said Coombs, referring to the 25-year-old Manning. "It
is naive to feel a duty to everybody, but what a beautiful feeling."

He
said it wasn't anti-American to have such feelings, arguing that it was
one of the principles the United States was founded on.

Coombs
replayed a video recording that Manning released to Wikileaks of an
helicopter attack that killed civilians and Reuters journalists in Iraq.

He asked Judge Denise Lind how she would have felt seeing that as a 21-year-old, as Manning was at the time.

"What do you do when you can't disengage, when these pictures are burnt into your mind?" Coombs asked.

Over four hours of intense closing arguments at Fort Meade in Maryland,
David Coombs set up a moral and legal clash of characterisations,
between the Manning that he laid out for the court, and the callous and
fame-obsessed Manning sketched on Thursday by the US government. "What
is the truth?" the lawyer asked Colonel Denise Lind, the presiding judge
who must now decide between the two accounts to reach her verdict."Is
Manning somebody who is a traitor with no loyalty to this country or
the flag, who wanted to download as much information as possible for his
employer WikiLeaks? Or is he a young, naive, well-intentioned soldier
who has his humanist belief central to his decisions and whose sole
purpose was to make a difference."Coombs answered his own
rhetorical question by arguing that all the evidence presented to the
trial over the past seven weeks pointed in one direction. "All the
forensics prove that he had a good motive: to spark reforms, to spark
change, to make a difference. He did not have a general evil intent."

Why would Coombs do that? By refusing to go before a jury, a defense is
left with making the case that laws are in conflict (we pointed that
out some time ago, June 3rd)
because then you're appealing to the judge's inherent vanity. You
present various conflicts and appeal to the judge's vanity to navigate
through it, to make a ruling that only s/he can do because this law
conflicts with that law and that law with this . . . Inviting the judge
into the maze is the defense's only hope at this point. And the
defense should have done that throughout the trial (but didn't) and the
defense should have questioned (and didn't) every superior on how they
were punished. None were. If Brad's actions were so outrageous,
punishment should have gone up the chain of command. It didn't.
Stressing that with each witness could have made that point clear.

Both the defense and prosecution
quoted Pfc. Manning telling an online confidant at the age of 22, "If
you had unprecedented access to classified networks 14 hours a day 7
days a week for 8+ months what would you do?" Defense attorney
David Coombs began his opening arguments with the second half of the
quote, in which Manning says he saw "incredible things, awful things,
things that belonged on the public domain." "That is a whistle-blower," Coombs said. "That is somebody that wants to inform the American public."

The government’s prosecution of Pfc Bradley Manning has always tried to
stretch the law to its breaking point to tack on as many charges as
possible, and has often played fast and loose with the facts, creating
growing signs of an unprofessional witch hunt attitude.But today lead prosecutor Maj. Ashden Fein sought to kick it up another notch, and with closing arguments nearing appears to have thrown any semblance of reality out the window in favor of furious rhetoric and ad hominem attacks.

Last night, Marcia wondered,
"How do they live with themselves. They are supposed to be following a
moral/ethical code, after all. They are supposed to care more about
honor than the civilian prosecutors. So exactly how do the military
prosecutors lying about Bradley live with themselves?
In the months and years after the verdict, will they be haunted by their
actions? Will they be sickened by their actions?" The DoD does have
standards of conduct so Marcia's question is one worth asking.

Explains Gloria Goodale (Christian Science Monitor):The decision this past week by the presiding military judge, Army Col.
Denise Lind, to refuse to dismiss charges of "aiding the enemy," which
carry a potential death sentence (though prosecutors have said they will
not pursue it), is particularly important. Colonel Lind said Private
Manning's military training would have given him knowledge that the
information he divulged could be seen by America’s foes."He was knowingly providing intelligence to the enemy," she said, according to Reuters.But
that standard is an almost impossible one in the Internet era, when
anything published is instantly available worldwide, Manning's
supporters say. The result is that anyone who wants to inform fellow
Americans about secret government actions – as Manning’s defense lawyers
claim he was trying to do – is in danger of life in prison, or perhaps
even death.

July 26, 2013, New York – Last night, the Center for
Constitutional Rights filed a request that the entire Ninth Circuit
Court of Appeals reconsider the dismissal of its lawsuit against
President Barack Obama, the head of the National Security Agency (NSA),
and the heads of the other major national security agencies, challenging
warrantless government surveillance of international telephone calls
and emails under the program first disclosed in December 2005 by The New York Times.
The dismissal came just five days after the publication of the first of
Edward Snowden’s revelations of broad NSA surveillance and the PRISM
program. The filing highlights the importance of judicial review of
secret NSA surveillance given the intense public debate about the
legality of the NSA’s tactics.

Said Center for Constitutional Rights Attorney Shayana
Kadidal, “Today’s filing challenges a catch-22 set up by the court: if
members of the public find proof they were subject to surveillance, the
proof is kicked out of the case as a state secret, but without such
proof, even the most rational fears of surveillance will be rejected as
‘too speculative’ to support standing. Given recent revelations about
the breadth of NSA surveillance, the plaintiffs’ fears are far from
speculative.”

The suit, CCR v. Obama,
was filed by the Center for Constitutional Rights on behalf of itself
and its legal staff working on national security cases whose
communications fit the criteria used by the NSA for targeting calls and
emails under its surveillance program. CCR attorneys argued the program
flouted existing surveillance statutes and had forced them to take
costly and burdensome countermeasures to minimize the risk of having
their privileged communications intercepted by the NSA.

The case, initially filed in 2006 against President George W.
Bush, sought an injunction that would prohibit the NSA from conducting
warrantless surveillance within the United States. When, in response,
the government claimed it had shut down the program in January 2007, the
CCR asked the court to order the government to destroy any records of
surveillance that it still retains from the illegal NSA program. The
lower court refused to do so, holding that a plaintiff challenging a
secret surveillance program must be able to prove they were actually
eavesdropped upon by the program in order to be able to challenge it in
court, and the case moved to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. A
three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit affirmed that decision, relying
on the Supreme Court’s February 2013 dismissal of a similar challenge to
the 2008 FISA Amendments Act, Clapper v. Amnesty International.

To date the Obama administration has refused to take a position on whether or not the original NSA program was legal.

The
Center for Constitutional Rights is dedicated to advancing and
protecting the rights guaranteed by the United States Constitution and
the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Founded in 1966 by attorneys
who represented civil rights movements in the South, CCR is a non-profit
legal and educational organization committed to the creative use of law
as a positive force for social change.

Today RT reports, "U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder has reassured his Russian
counterpart that whistleblower Edward Snowden will not be tortured or
given the death penalty if Moscow extradites him. The information emerged after the US Department of Justice
disclosed the contents of a July 23 letter, which had generated
fevered speculation on both sides of the Atlantic."

MS. PSAKI: Sure.QUESTION: And this has – it’s not really Russia, but it’s Snowden and Senator Graham’s proposal from yesterday --MS. PSAKI: Mm-hmm.QUESTION: -- that would require sanctions against any country that
takes him in or helps him out. What does the Administration think of
that?MS. PSAKI: I believe – let me – I have something on this, I
believe, Matt. Let me just check. And if not, I’ll get you something
right after the briefing. Well, in this case, we have not seen the text
of the proposed bill, but we feel that in general legislation imposing
sanctions under these circumstances would not be helpful.QUESTION: And is that because that you believe that it should
be the executive branch’s prerogative to do this if and – to do it if
and when you see fit?MS. PSAKI: Sanctions?QUESTION: Yeah.MS. PSAKI: Well, I’m not going to make a prediction about any --QUESTION: Well, I mean, you said --MS. PSAKI: -- step we may or may not take.QUESTION: I understand that.MS. PSAKI: We just don’t think this particularly helpful.QUESTION: Why?QUESTION: Why?QUESTION: Well, I understand that, but – I understand what you’re saying.MS. PSAKI: Mm-hmm.QUESTION: I would echo the why do you not think it’s helpful.
But also, I mean, is it just – is it a general objection that you don’t
want Congress legislating foreign policy?MS. PSAKI: I don’t believe so. I’m not sure where you’re going with this.QUESTION: I’m just asking. I mean, is the – if the objective
is only that this is unhelpful, this specific thing is unhelpful, can
you explain why you think it’s unhelpful? But in general, the
Administration and past administrations have resisted attempts by
Congress –MS. PSAKI: Mm-hmm.QUESTION: -- to legislate foreign policy.MS. PSAKI: Well --QUESTION: And so I’m wondering if your objection to this is related to that.MS. PSAKI: Our focus in this specific case, as you know, is
having Mr. Snowden returned to the United States, and we still feel
Russia has the opportunity to do that and to take the right steps.QUESTION: Right.MS. PSAKI: Beyond that, I just don’t have any more evaluation or analysis for you.QUESTION: No, but I’m talking about Senator Graham’s proposal.MS. PSAKI: Mm-hmm. I just don’t – I don’t have anything more on that for you.QUESTION: Because it’s – but you are – but it says you think that – you’ve said that you think it’s unhelpful, right?MS. PSAKI: Mm-hmm.QUESTION: Okay. So why is it unhelpful? Or is it just more
broadly there’s an objection because it would be Congress legislating
the executive branch’s ability to conduct foreign policy?MS. PSAKI: I’d have to talk more to our legislative team, Matt. I just don’t have any more specifics than what I offered.QUESTION: Because it seems to me that these days or nowadays, after yesterday at least --MS. PSAKI: Mm-hmm.QUESTION: -- that it doesn’t really matter what Congress
enacts into law, because you can just choose to ignore it if you feel
like you want to.MS. PSAKI: It certainly does matter. That’s why we’re
continuing to work closely with them on Egypt. I knew you were going
somewhere with this.QUESTION: No, I wasn’t. That just occurred to me at the very end.

It is high time Russia granted political asylum to Snowden, President
of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko told media on 26 July, BelTA has
learned. “The matter has been spun out of control and it is likely that today
Russia’s leadership may not know what to do with Snowden. In their
place I would not stress myself too much but would go ahead and grant
political asylum to him,” said the Belarus President.Alexander Lukashenko explained his view by saying that America has
given shelter to hundreds of Russian traitors. “They have given shelter
to so many people, have stolen so many secrets from us, they have
sheltered so many terrorists, whose extradition Russia demands,” the
Belarusian leader said.